Halifax man finds his restaurant industry career in Toronto

Keegan deWitt of Halifax, right, and a colleague share a laugh just inside the kitchen at Dreyfus, the critically acclaimed Toronto restaurant where deWitt has found the perfect food industry job.

Serving others, and himself

The text arrived in Halifax 10 minutes after the start of dinner at Dreyfus, Toronto’s hottest restaurant.

“Our server is f------ elite.”

By chance, that server, Keegan deWitt, happens to be from Halifax.

DeWitt, 25, graduated from Citadel High and, because his parents wanted him to, enrolled at Saint Mary’s, where he didn’t last long. Same for a stint at Holland College.

Having tried two things he was never passionate about in the first place, he decided to make himself happy.

“I started looking outwardly and thinking, ‘OK, what does make me happy and what do I enjoy doing?’ That was tasting different things, experiencing new flavours,” deWitt said during a visit home this week. “It started with cocktails and going out for little snacks, and that led into me realizing maybe I should try working in this industry.”

His first job was as a food runner at Agricola Street Brasserie, four years ago. From there, it was on to Kitchen Table, Chives (“Where I really cut my teeth on what it meant to serve”), Little Oak, Bishop’s Cellar and the opening team at Bar Kismet and Ostrich Club.

Stubbornness was one reason he moved around so much, but he also had a goal.

“I moved from restaurant to restaurant that I saw as different opportunities and would help me expedite the process of learning more and becoming someone in the industry with somewhat of a reputation, just learning more,” he said. “I think I had hit a ceiling for myself in this city, with places I wanted to work and that could cater to what I now felt my needs to be. I wanted to switch it up, to change the teachers around me.”

When the chef at highly regarded Toronto wine bar Paris Paris came to Halifax to do a pop up, deWitt asked if there might be a spot for him.

“She offered me a job on the spot, I booked a flight that day and left two weeks later,” he said.

If you want to read raves about a restaurant, look up Dreyfus, which opened this spring. Diners have to book weeks in advance, and professional critics are in love.

Before it opened, deWitt had almost decided to make one more move, to Montreal. He speaks French, the city has the best food and wine vibe in the country, and rent is cheaper. But Dreyfus makes him feel like Montreal came to him.

“I basically heard through the grapevine that there were ex-pats from Montreal, who worked at Joe Beef, coming to open a restaurant,” he said. “I immediately jumped on that, set up an interview, and went in just as the space was being finished. I basically laid it down for them that I’d been following this group of restaurants in Montreal forever, I’d been going to eat at them since I was able to go eat at them. I go back two times a year.”

One of the people at dinner last Saturday night (not the one sending profanities via text) was Rachel Krisko, who grew up in Simcoe, Ont., eating out about once a week. Now that she lives in Toronto, she’s in restaurants more often. Better restaurants.

“There’s way more variety and obviously better quality places to eat than growing up in Simcoe,” said Krisko, a consulting analyst. “I’ve never waitressed at a fine dining restaurant, but I did work at Boston Pizza for one summer, so I have some experience in service. It’s obviously a different clientele that what you would get at Dreyfus, but I understand the idea behind good service and what makes a dining experience.”

She and her date realized right away that deWitt was not somebody working as a server to make ends meet while he looked for something else. His passion shone through from the start.

“From when he asked us about drinks and there was no wine menu,” said Krisko. “He just asked a few quick questions — what type of wine we were looking for — and just based on three words, he put together three options for us, brought out the bottles and described each of them, with the price points. I was very impressed, thought it was seamless the way he did everything. He’s extremely knowledgeable and it was nice that we didn’t have to search through a menu. I hadn’t experienced that before.”

DeWitt isn’t surprised to have this anecdote related to him — he expects every table he serves to feel the same way. If there’s room, he actually sits down with customers to talk about the menu and he says being at eye level makes the interaction more intimate.

“A lot of people say ‘Just bring me the experience,’ which makes my life just fabulous because I get to give them the experience I think they want, based on who they are and what I’ve learned from them at this point,” he said. “You get to cater these wonderful experiences that people go to to get pleasure, and everyone has this pleasurable, wonderful, magic experience. I’m stoked to be doing it, because I’m causing you to have this wonderful time and that gives me recognition that I’m executing all the things I’m trying to execute in a proper way.”

It wouldn’t be right to say there are no career servers in Halifax. But there aren’t many, and they stand out.

For deWitt, it’s a great gig.

“There’s good money in the restaurant industry. You can make a lot of tips. To be a career server and someone who’s very much part of this industry (you have to) want to go above and beyond, you have to be doing it for the right reasons,” he said. “It’s taken me a long time to get to a place where execution-wise and the things I have to do, I’m doing really well. And the confidence I’ve gained from working so many hours and working so many different places, taking all the best part of those places, shape who I am as a server and let me give you the full Keegan as well.”